NASCAR Barometer: Kyle Larson Charges to Homestead Victory

Coming into Sunday's race at Homestead-Miami Speedway, everyone's focus was on Kyle Larson who has just dominated at this venue over the years due to his ability to run right against the wall and make big speed on the long run. He also won the Truck Series race on Friday night, and lapped up to 5th place in the Xfinity Series race before a late caution came out and he was defeated on a green-white-checkered finish. It by no means was the dominant type of showing from Larson in the Cup race, but at the end of the day he was the one in the right position at the end and was able to put the pressure on teammate Alex Bowman, ultimately making the pass when the No. 48 got in the wall with 7 laps to go. 

Larson becomes the fourth man to win a race in 2025 joining Christopher Bell (3), William Byron (1) and Josh Berry (1). Even despite a late pit road speeding penalty, Byron scored a number of stage points again and rallied back to finish 12th and extend his point lead to 36 points after his nearest pursuer of Bell coming into the week had a terrible day at Homestead. Hendrick Motorsports has come out of the gates strong again this season and now holds the top-three spots in the championship fight with Larson in second and Bowman in third. Next up will be the shortest track on the schedule in Martinsville where HMS has won at 29 times previously, including last Spring where William Byron headlined a 1-2-3 finish on the team's 40th anniversary weekend.  

UPGRADE

Kyle Larson - This was basically the opposite of how most of Larson's races go at Homestead. Instead of starting up front and leading a ton of laps, Larson had to slowly make his way up through the field from 14th. The No. 5 car didn't have much to write home about on the short run, but after 30 laps or so he would start going forward. Crew chief Cliff Daniels made an alternate strategy call in Stage 2 to run long on the first stint and then use his tire advantage to drive back through the field. Larson nearly collected his third stage win of the year in the process, but was barely edged out by Denny Hamlin. The strategy call gave Larson the track position he needed, however, and he put himself in a great position to take advantage of his long-run car in the final stage. It looked like it was going to be too little too late with around 20 to go, but Larson's car took off and got past Chase Briscoe then Bubba Wallace. He began running down teammate Alex Bowman and forced the No. 48 into a mistake when he got into the wall off of turn 4 and Larson was able to get around him for his 30th career victory. Next up is Martinsville, which has turned into one of Larson's best tracks in the NextGen era. He has finished 2nd-1st-6th-2nd-3rd in his last five races at the Virginia track. 

Alex Bowman - After picking up his sixth career pole on Saturday, Bowman was able to hold onto that great track position, racing inside the top-five nearly the entire race on Sunday. He put himself in great position for the final restart where he was able to cycle out second on the restart, and eventually chase down Bubba Wallace and make the pass with just over 30 laps to go. Bowman looked like he was managing everything great, but once Kyle Larson's car came alive on the long run it was always going to be very hard to hold him off. Bowman hadn't really been running the wall the whole race, but had to put his car up there to take away Larson's line. With the tires fading on the No. 48, he slipped just a bit into the wall and Larson was able to make the easy pass. Bowman will be kicking himself for not closing out the victory, but he continues to run very strong and has now finished top-10 in the last four races. Bowman will look to continue to keep that streak going at Martinsville, but he has just one top-10 at "The Paperclip" in his last five races there since his victory in the fall of 2021. 

Bubba Wallace - Wallace has had no issues qualifying well and scoring stage points, but it has been the final part of these races that have been a big struggle for this No. 23 team. That was not the case on Sunday as Wallace and team put a full race together and were in the mix all day. Wallace had what looked to be the fastest short-run car in the field and he would storm to the lead on the restart on a couple different occasions. Wallace led 56 laps in the race, but was chased down by Bowman with just over 30 laps to go. Wallace was able to hang on for a third place, which snapped a streak of three straight finishes of 20th-or-worse. Wallace also moves up to seventh in the championship standings. He will look for another good showing at Martinsville where he finished 11th-or-better in four of his last five races, including grabbing a fourth last spring. 

Denny Hamlin - It wasn't an ideal start to the weekend for Hamlin as he was only able to manage 23rd in qualifying. In an effort to try to make up some track position, Hamlin and crew chief Chris Gayle decided to run long in both stages to try to get a tire advantage for the second half of the run. The No. 11 got close to the top-10 at the end of Stage 1, then after a couple great pit stops again for this team in Stage 2, Hamlin was able to use the fresher tires to cut through the field and score in the stage victory. He seemed to be in a good position as the race wound down, but was unable to get around Kyle Larson and Chase Briscoe on the last run and kind of just got stuck in fifth place. Nevertheless, it was still a good showing for this team after a sloppy performance last week at Las Vegas. Hamlin has been one of the best drivers in the NextGen era at short tracks and will look to continue that next time out at Martinsville where he owns five career victories, but none since 2015. Hamlin has led 1,136 laps since that last win at Martinsville, however. Perhaps it's his time for career win No. 55 and his first of 2025. 

Chris Buescher - Tied with Hamlin for eighth in the championship standings after six races is Buescher who collected his fourth top-10 of the season with a methodical sixth-place showing at Homestead. Buescher was barely even mentioned at all on the broadcast, but he did a great job of keeping his nose clean and taking advantage when some of the faster cars had some issues in Stage 3. Crew chief Scott Graves also seemed to dial in the car at the right time to allow Buescher to make some passes towards the end and get another strong result. RFK doesn't seem to have quite the same speed as they did early last season, but Buescher has been great at not making mistakes and being there at the end, unlike teammate Brad Keselowski who finds himself 30th in points. Martinsville will be a challenge for this No. 17 team, however, as they qualified 30th and 26th in the two races last year, and finished 15th and 30th, respectively. 

DOWNGRADE

Christopher Bell - It was really a struggle all weekend for this No. 20 team. They did not show much speed in practice, struggling in particular on the long run, and they also only managed a 16th-place qualifying effort. When the race started Bell went backwards and then went for a spin all by himself off a turn four towards the end of Stage 2. Bell lost a lap as the teams made repairs to the car and they did not run on the lead lap for much from that point on. It's unclear exactly what was wrong with the car, as Bell didn't get much damage on his spin, but it seemed like they just couldn't keep any life in the tires. This certainly was a shocking result considering how well Bell has run this season and how great his history has been at Homestead in the Cup Series. The whole team will need to regroup going to Martinsville next week where they really struggled a year ago finishing 35th and 22nd in the two races. 

Chase Elliott - Elliott and team once again struggled to find the same pace as their teammates at Homestead. He looked to have a good long-run car in practice, but it didn't really play out in the race starting in 18th place. Once they finally got track position to start Stage 3, Elliott got a penalty on pit road and would not be able to recover, ultimately settling for an 18th place finish. This team has gotten some solid results, but has not really showed contending speed anywhere outside of COTA in the first six races. Crew chief Alan Gustafson needs to do a better job bringing speed off the truck which will allow them to qualify better and keep their car in clean air. It seems like they are constantly losing positions on short runs and getting stuck in traffic for larger portions of these races. Martinsville should be a good chance for them to rebound as Elliott qualified and finished in the top-three in both races last season. 

Ross Chastain - One week after the Trackhouse cars showed a ton of speed at another 1.5 mile track in Las Vegas, they were nowhere to be found this week at Homestead. Even when the other three cars are a little off, Chastain usually is able to grind his way to a top-15 at minimum. That was not the case this time as Chastain started 25th and ended up 31st by the end of the race one lap down. He had finished top-12 in the last four races, but Homestead was a big letdown. This No. 1 team needs to reset for Martinsville where they have finished 14th-or-better in six straight races. 

Joey Logano - Six races and zero top-10 finishes for the defending champion. Logano had a decent qualifying effort in 12th, but from the drop of the green flag their car clearly lacked the speed of his teammates of Ryan Blaney and Austin Cindric. Everything Paul Wolfe threw at the car didn't seem to help much and it was another middling finish of 14th for this team. This isn't much different than the start they had last season, but certainly this isn't how we expect a three-time champion to be running. The Penske cars have been best in the NextGen era on flat tracks and so hopefully this No. 22 team is able to turn things around at Martinsville where Logano has finished top-10 in 11 consecutive races. 

Kyle Busch - Homestead is typically one of Busch's better tracks, but he was nowhere to be found on Sunday, running outside the top-20 for pretty much the entire race. Busch struggled out of the gate in practice with a tight race car and getting way back in traffic the whole race certainly didn't help that at all. Since Busch moved to RCR there's just been too many weekends like this where a driver this talented is just completely irrelevant. This was a team that was trending up towards the end of last season, but now finds itself 17th in the standings after two really tough weeks in a row. Busch now heads to a great track for him in Martinsville, but in four races with RCR he has finished 21st-27th-16th-28th. 

BIGGEST SURPRISE

Ryan Blaney - In this era of NASCAR we rarely see many engine issues anymore, but Blaney has now had two blown engines in the last three races. He was running inside the top-10 in Phoenix when the first one happened, but this race he seemed to have the fastest car. Blaney surged from his sixth starting position to take the lead on lap 9 before driving out to a big lead. He was able to win Stage 1, and likely would have won Stage 2 as well had it not been for a slow pit stop. Blaney was able to recover after some contact on pit road to begin Stage 3 and looked like he was going to be in a good spot to challenge for the win. His engine then went up in smoke running third and marked his third straight finish of 28th-or-worse. Blaney has had a lot of speed this season, but just needs the luck to go with it. Martinsville comes at the perfect time for this team as it is Blaney's best track with two wins in the last three races. He hasn't finished worse than 11th in his last 12 races at the track.